Scammers use a diverse variety of methods to allure and dupe unsuspecting victims. Some ads and offers look so real that even the most seasoned internet veterans can be tricked. However, many scams target people new to the market who may be more susceptible to “get rich quick” schemes because they're unaware of what you can reasonably make taking surveys. It is incredibly uncommon to be offered more than $10 to complete a 20 minute survey. Not that one offering that or more is definitely a scam, it's just important to be cautious. While some experienced and well credited survey takers receive legitimate offers paying that pay big money, if you're new to survey taking you should definitely steer clear of anyone offering you hundreds to complete a survey.
Or, you might already have an app that includes a survey builder. Many form builder apps include survey templates, and all could be used to make a survey with a little extra work. Marketing automation tools—including email marketing apps like Constant Contact and VerticalResponse—also often include survey builders, so if you're already using one of them for your marketing it might be best to use it for surveys, too.
One of the most important ways to determine whether respondents are interpreting questions as intended and whether the order of questions may influence responses is to conduct a pretest using a small sample of people from the survey population. The pretest is conducted using the same protocol and setting as the survey and is typically conducted once the questionnaire and procedures have been finalized.
Something very important to note before signing up at any site claiming to pay you cash to take surveys is that all legitimate sites offering online surveys that pay do not charge registration fees – they are free to join. Some sites may even offer you bonus as you sign in, to show you they are happy you have become a part of their team and helping them increase their revenue.
Although there are thousands of legitimate work-at-home jobs available, it’s always a good idea to proceed with caution. There are plenty of less than stellar opportunities out there, promising big results with little or no return. While some of these are just bad gigs, others are straight up scams, looking to prey on dreams of those looking for a real work-at-home jobs.
Looking for a survey tool you can run on your own server? LimeSurvey is the app for you. It's an open-source survey project that lets you build detailed surveys, host them on your own, or embed them in Drupal or WordPress sites. Surveys have just about any feature you could want, though you'll have to dig through menus to set them up, add question sections, and then tack on individual questions.
Also keep in mind that communication with a telecommuting team requires an extra layer of crystal clear clarity. Since almost everything is done via email (and there are no facial or body clues to read), you’ll need to make sure that you mean what you, um, type. I’ve found that shorter, more succinct sentences go a lot farther than long-winded soliloquies.
What It Is: Many companies pay online testers to make sure websites are intuitive and easy to navigate. "You basically follow the instructions you're given to check out the website," says Anna Thurman, founder of RealWaysToEarnMoneyOnline.com, a site that has reviewed more than 500 online work opportunities. "It usually only takes about 15 minutes per test." Thurman recommends registering with 10 to 12 different companies since the opportunities to test these sites are doled out first come, first served. "There are people who make $100 to $200 a month by staying on top of those tests," Thurman says.
Kwik Surveys lets you fully export your results in multiple file types, meaning you can analyze your results in Excel or statistics software of choice. Why does this matter? Instead of just seeing your overall results, you can manipulate the data and get useful insights by testing for significance or putting related questions together in crosstabs. Kwik Surveys will clear your data after six months, so exporting is key if you want to keep a record of the surveys you’ve already run.
Global Test Market is a decent standard of what you're getting yourself involved in. Their practices are not any more or less shady or reputable than almost any online venue – survey or otherwise. Just like Facebook, when you identify yourself accurately with Global Test Market, you can expect them to use that information in any way possible to make a penny. The great news is they inform you and ask for consent first.

Unlike some of the other sites, with Inbox Dollar, you essentially sign up to take advantage of whatever Inbox Dollar makes from their advertisers. They will send you emails which they get paid per receipt of you reading them or clicking a link. In turn, they give you a cut. Not to ruin your day but it's a rather small cut. The links that end up paying out the most usually have some stipulations attached – such as signing up for a service. This can end up being a lot more hassle than its worth and we recommend you pay VERY close attention to the stipulations.

If you’re still not having any luck with the jobs I've shared above – check out FlexJobs. The company has a A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau, along with a money-back policy if you are unhappy with the website. FlexJobs guarantees that every single job is hand-screened for legitimacy. This is a great way to search for legitimate work at home jobs without the hassle of dealing with scams.
Want a simple way to keep track of the best survey apps? We've put together a PDF download with the most important info from this roundup, so you can easily compare the best survey apps, share them with your team, and decide on the perfect tool for your work. You'll find each of the apps listed, along with their best features and pricing—just as in the table above.

Now, don’t get me wrong. There are people who do make a few thousand dollars or more a year with paid surveys. But that’s not the norm. If you do want to increase your earnings substantially, your best bet is to also join focus groups (we have a big list of ’em. Just do a quick search on Google for “moneypantry.com focus groups”). They pay much more between $50 to $400 or more per focus group secession.

While it might be hard to believe at first, American Consumer Opinion will pay you real, actual money to share your opinions and complete online surveys. Once you join their online opinion panel, you’ll be asked to offer opinions on new products you have tried, test out new advertising campaigns, and tell companies what you think of their marketing techniques and slogans.

When it comes to a company’s work from home policy, everyone is different. Your productivity and overall success as a remote employee depends entirely on your preferred work style. That’s also the reason it’s hard to find any solid data on whether or not people are more productive at home. Anecdotally, it seems to boil down to personality type and the job you do. We’re all different, and some of us can’t fathom getting work done with a TV nearby and all our comforts of home surrounding us, while others find it a struggle to stay focused among office chatter and other distractions.

Marketer Adrien O'leary uses Zapier to share his FluidSurveys survey with every new contact he adds to his Knack database. Zapier copies the email of the contact, and sends it to FluidSurveys, which then sends the survey invite to the new contact automatically. "I also pass parameters in the survey URL so some elements of the survey (like name of a client's business) can be customized," says Adrien.

Illegitimate companies and scammers have a simple objective. They're after your information in order to get your money. It's much more common for internet scammers to target hundreds of people for small sums rather than a single person for thousands. This is because demanding large sums for a product that is somewhat unclear is an obvious red flag to most.

In most ways, iSay is identical to the other sites on the list. One thing which sets them apart is the “Poll Predictor.” If you’ve been on a survey site before, you know one of the most frustrating things is to enter a survey, answer a few questions, and then get kicked out for not qualifying. If this happens with iSay, you get asked a Poll Predictor question. These are questions like “Have you ever been overseas?” and you have to guess what percentage of people said yes. The closer you are to the right answer; the more chances you get for winning the prize drawing.

Questions with ordinal response categories – those with an underlying order (e.g., excellent, good, only fair, poor OR very favorable, mostly favorable, mostly unfavorable, very unfavorable) – are generally not randomized because the order of the categories conveys important information to help respondents answer the question. Generally, these types of scales should be presented in order so respondents can easily place their responses along the continuum, but the order can be reversed for some respondents. For example, in one of the Pew Research Center’s questions about abortion, half of the sample is asked whether abortion should be “legal in all cases, legal in most cases, illegal in most cases, illegal in all cases” while the other half of the sample is asked the same question with the response categories read in reverse order, starting with “illegal in all cases.” Again, reversing the order does not eliminate the recency effect but distributes it randomly across the population.